


There's Gonna Come a Day When You Feel Better

by periferal



Category: RWBY
Genre: Alternate Universe - High School, F/F, Fluff, Friendship, Gen, Multi, Short One Shot, Sick Character, Tooth-Rotting Fluff
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2018-05-31
Updated: 2018-05-31
Packaged: 2019-05-16 12:35:17
Rating: Teen And Up Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 1,312
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/14811482
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/periferal/pseuds/periferal
Summary: Ren's sick, at school. He doesn't even have class, he shouldn't be here.Pyrrha notices, and gets Nora.





	There's Gonna Come a Day When You Feel Better

Pyrra found Ren curled up under the communal blanket on the least sketchy couch in the junior senior room. It was the one farthest from the door and had actual fabric instead of weird white stuff that was constantly flaking off onto the clothes of whoever sat on it. 

Occasionally, an arm would appear as he was wracked by a coughing fit. 

“What are you doing here?” Pyrrha asked, sitting on one of the not broken rolly chairs. 

“Couldn’t leave Nora unsupervised,” a voice said from among the blankets. “She had D&D.”

Neither of them had class on Mondays. That was what questionable scheduling choices were all about. 

Pyrrha sighed. “You’re sick,” she said. “And Nora can supervise herse—” she paused. “Okay, that last part isn’t as true. But still.”

Ren pulled the blanket so far over his head his legs became visible. “I didn’t want to stay home by myself,” he said. “I’m feeling better than I did this weekend.”

“Considering you were basically a zombie this weekend, that’s not saying much.” Ren and Nora lived with Pyrrha, Jaune, and Pyrrha’s family. The reasons for this were long, complicated, and involved a lot of paperwork that was mostly her parents’ responsibility. 

Their conversation was briefly interrupted by a yell from the direction of the circle of people sitting at the table with their gaming laptops. It was Ruby, and presumably something had gone well in Overwatch. What, exactly, Pyrrha was not sure of, since she vastly preferred fighting games, but—she looked over to check—yep, Ruby was doing her victory dance. 

Another cough brought her back to Ren. “Seriously, no one would mind if you went home. I could even drive you.”

“Don’t want you to miss your class for that,” Ren said. He sat up, the blanket falling off his face as he did. 

He looked miserable. It wasn’t anything specific, other than his face being a bit puffy, but it still proved Pyrrha’s point far more than his. “I’m getting Nora,” she said. “I have class soon, and I can’t trust any of these doofuses,” she pointed at the gaming circle, which also included Jaune, Blake, Yang, and Weiss, “to actually take care of you.”

“I don’t need taking care of,” he protested. It was a very weak protest, and Pyrrha ignored him. 

The hallway, compared to the junior senior room, was both quiet and did not smell like day old Chinese food. Pyrrha noticed too late that she was not wearing any shoes, and so she would just have to hope that Professor Goodwitch would not walk by.

Nora’s D&D was happening in an empty classroom. As Pyrrha walked in, she found Nora standing on one of the long tables, dancing, while Sun and Ilia stared at a pile of dice in disbelief. 

“Nora?” Hearing her name, Nora part-fell part-clambered down off the table. 

“Yes?”

“Did Ren tell you he was feeling okay this morning?” Pyrrha asked. 

Nora nodded her head. Her expression morphed quickly into one of open suspicion. “He lied to me, didn’t he.” She knocked her fist against the side of her leg, upsetting the careful arrangement of her multilayered skirt. “Fuck damn it,” she said, storming out of the room. 

Sun was still starring at the dice, while Ilia was looking at Pyrrha. Before she could ask whatever she was about to ask (probably “What the fuck?”), Pyrrha said, “Ren’s pretty sick,” she said. “He’s here because he’s an idiot, and I have class soon.”

Ilia nodded. “You know, it’s probably for the best you interrupted us. We both need to roll up new characters, and that might take a while.”

“FUCK,” Sun finally said. He shoved all the dice into a drawstring bag. “Excuse me, I need to go interrupt Blake’s game of Ninjas of Love so I can cry on her shoulder,” he added, half-sincerely storming out. 

“We could also, like, make out, if you wanted,” Ilia called after him, but it was too late. She sighed. “I think I’m going to go harass Blake too,” she said. “Nora’s a mean DM,” she added. It sounded mostly like a compliment. 

Pyrrha checked her watch. She really, really had to get to class now. 

* * *

 

Ren pushed the blanket back over his face as he saw Nora slam the door to the junior senior room open. They would have left soon anyway, so there was no reason for her to interrupt her D&D game for his sake. 

“Hey,” Nora said. He felt her settle on the patch of empty couch by his feet. “You told me you were okay this morning.”

“Yes,” Ren said. He sighed. “I didn’t want to be alone at the house.”

Pyrrha’s parents both worked, and theirs’ was a big house. At least at school, especially on days when most seniors didn’t have that many (or any) classes, Ren could choose between being by himself (hiding in the stairwell, or elsewhere similar), or being around others in the junior senior room. And telling Nora he was fine meant she worried about him less, which was a good thing. 

He didn’t explain that last part, because then Nora would just point out how silly he was being. 

He felt Nora pat his foot. “If you’d told me, I could have just skipped D&D.” She cackled. “I think Sun and Ilia would have appreciated that, anyway.”

At that moment, Ren heard Sun say, “Blake, Blake, I need to bitch about D&D.”

“Your DM’s right here.”

“She’ll probably take it as a compliment.”

He tuned the rest of the conversation out, even as Ilia joined. 

“I don’t want you to miss your fun just for my sake,” Ren said.

Nora somehow found his nose through the blanket and poked it. “Stop that,” she said. “You’re dying—”

“I’m not dying.”

“You’re dying,” she continued, undeterred, “and dying friends need people by their bedsides. And you spend so much time listening to me scream and deal with the after effects of nightmares about when our parents died in a fire, so I can hang out with you at Pyrrha’s house and, idk, read poetry out loud to you.”

“I really wish you’d stop bringing up our childhood trauma every time you want to make a point.” Ren pulled the blanket off his head just in time to see Nora shrug. 

“You pulled your blanket off your head, didn’t you?” she asked. 

Ren nodded. “Fair.”

“I’m going to drive home soon, and you’re coming with me, and then I can make you some pancakes and then we can play video games, or I can play video games and you can watch me, and you won’t be by yourself and I can harass Pyrrha’s cats. It’s not just a win/win, it’s several wins all hanging out together!” Nora stood up. “You can stand up?”

Ren tried. As it turned out, he only needed to steady himself against the couch for a few seconds, his vision going weird after so long lying down. “Pretty much,” he said.

Nora poked him again. “Hey,” she said. “No lying to me.”

“It’s not lying,” Ren said. “I’m standing, aren’t I?”

Nora poked him for a third time. “Come on,” she said, grabbing his hand. She didn’t drag him with the same degree of violent enthusiasm she usually did, which he appreciated.   
Going home and hanging out with her would be nice, he thought. He didn’t have that much homework at this time of year anyway, and even though he would never say it, having Nora fuss over him like this was… nice. 

He put on NPR in the car, watching the road change to tree lined highway, as Nora held a one-sided conversation with one of the guests on the show that happened to be on. 

“Thank you,” he said.

“No problem,” she said.   



End file.
